Koons Collision Repair Center
Holds car hostage after charging top dollar for sloppy fix-it job ripoff

Koons Collision Repair Center in Alexandria, Virginia, has kept my car locked up outside behind a chain link fence for over three months without properly repairing it. The Koons manager insists Koons will not correct the mistake and is demanding I pay full price (about $4,000) for the improper repair.

It's a beige car with light grey and chrome trim. It used to have a matching silver and chrome grille but Koons slapped a cheap-looking dark black one on there. It looks worse than tan shoes with a black tuxedo now, but Koons refuses to correct their error.

Koons has given me five different excuses to explain why Koons put the wrong front end on my vehicle. One of those stories might be true, but all five can't be.

Specifically, Koons manager Denny Lee at various times has claimed that:
1) Koons simply ordered the wrong part;
2) Koons wasn't sure what part to order because damage to the front end of the vehicle confused them;
3) Koons actually ordered and received three proper silver grilles but they had imperfections on them and couldn't be used;
4) Koons was trying to save me money by installing the cheaper base-model black grille;
and, finally,
5) Koons could not get the proper grille because it is an older model and parts are not available.

Note that my car is a Ford Explorer, the SUV sales leader for 14 straight years. There are more than 5.5 million Explorers on the road. A Ford dealer told thenewspaper.com, a motoring enthusiast web site, that every single part is available for these SUVs, no problem. I even found a brand-new OEM grille for my model year on ebay in about one minute of searching.

Over the past three months, I've talked with the manager of the shop several times, gone to the office, and a month ago even faxed a letter to Jim Koons, owner of the company, to try to get my SUV back. I got no response from Mr. Koons and the corporate customer service department has not returned my last two calls. Koons is basically holding my car hostage to try to force me to pay for their shoddy repair.

The Koons manager has been confrontational from the outset. When I mentioned that putting the wrong grille on a car is a pretty obvious error, he disagreed with me and said it wasn't a big deal. When I said I would not pay for the Koons repair with the wrong grille on the car, he at first said Koons could order the right grille but that I would have to pay for the (second) new grille and the labor cost of removing the wrong one and installing the right one.

In other words, the Koons manager was going to make me pay for the Koons mistake. As mentioned above, his story about the wrong grille changed a few times, and he later dropped the idea that I would have to pay for two grilles after I protested that the notion was absurd.

Another canard the Koons manager continues to use is that he has been trying to save me money. This is obviously not the case because he gave me the same estimate (around $3,800) that one of his Koons colleagues had previously given me, and the other colleague was not factoring in any alleged savings. The colleague did suggest that Koons might be able to get the cost down if they used second-hand parts but assured that "you won't be able to tell any difference by looking at it" and that they only use the best parts.instead, what I ended up with were cheaper parts AND the full-cost of the repair. It is also relevant to note that at no time did they call me to ask if it was acceptable to put the wrong color grille on my vehicle.

To make matters worse, this is my second unsatisfactory experience at this Koons collision repair shop. An earlier Koons repair took four trips until Koons got the car more-or-less right. At first, during that first repair, Koons said my vehicle was ready when it only had a pinstripe on half the car—a pretty major and obvious error (not to mention a silly one).

Next, a new rear hatch rattled horribly because packing material had been shoved into the door by Koons during its reassembly. Yet another time, I arrived to pick up my vehicle and was told unapologetically by Koons that the phone call that it was ready was a mistake. At this Koons location, they obviously don't care if they waste customers' time.

After the first fiasco, I filled out a complaint card and the Koons manager responded that Koons would give me a big discount if I gave them a second chance next time I needed auto repair work. The current Koons manager now refuses to honor that previous commitment made by Koons. It obviously was a big mistake to trust their word and to give Koons a second chance. From beginning to end, my experience with Koons Collision Repair Service has been a case study in bad customer service and rude customer relations.

B.
Alexandria, Virginia
U.S.A.

Company: Koons Collision Repair Center
Country: USA
State: Virginia
City: Alexandria
Address: 5800 Edsall Roard
Phone: 7038236100

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